As President Clinton warned President Saddam Hussein that the US was ready "to act" if he did not comply with UN requirements for weapons inspections, the build-up of American forces in the Gulf region accelerated. UN weapons inspectors and humanitarian workers have now all been evacuated from Iraq in anticipation of a US attack.
Security staff briefed the President at the White House on the latest situation and aides said he was close to taking a decision to launch attacks. He made further calls to foreign leaders to try and ensure international support for such action.
Speaking at the Veterans' Day commemoration ceremony at Arlington Cemetery, Mr Clinton said the US has "gone the extra mile" to obtain compliance from Iraq by peaceful means.
While the UN inspection team, known as UNSCOM, was being pulled out of Baghdad, President Clinton said that if they were not allowed to visit inspection sites or monitor Iraqi compliance at known production facilities, "they might as well be in Baltimore, not Baghdad".
President Saddam Hussein last month banned UNSCOM from carrying out its inspection of sites where Iraq is suspected of producing weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and biological ones.
President Clinton warned that preventing UNSCOM from carrying out its task would "open a window of opportunity for Iraq to rebuild its arsenal of weapons and delivery systems in months - I say again months - not years. Failure to respond could embolden Saddam Hussein to act recklessly" against his neighbours.
"We continue to hope and pray that Saddam will comply but we must be prepared to act if he does not," Mr Clinton said to applause from the attendance at the memorial ceremony.
Soon afterwards, the Secretary of Defence, Mr William Cohen, signed an order to deploy 129 more bomber and fighter aircraft to the Gulf region. This is in addition to the order already given to speed up the deployment of the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise and a Marine task force.
These ships would join 23 others, including the carrier USS Eisenhower, already in the region, and bring the strength of US forces there up to the level reached during the last crisis with Iraq in February. There are also 23,500 US troops in the region, including 1,500 in Kuwait on training exercises.
Mr Cohen has now authorised the dispatch of another 3,000 troops to Kuwait and the deployment of extra Patriot anti-missile batteries in Saudi Arabia.
Many of the US ships in the region are armed with Cruise missiles, which will be the most used weapon if the US attacks Iraq. The 12 B-52 bombers which are now being sent to the British island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean are equipped with 96 Cruise missiles, each with 2,000-lb explosive warheads.
The UN Security Council met again yesterday in New York at Russia's request, to discuss the decision to withdraw all the UN inspectors from Baghdad. The decision was taken by the head of UNSCOM, Australian diplomat Mr Richard Butler.
He told journalists at UN headquarters that after consulting with the Secretary General, Mr Kofi Annan, he took the decision following a recommendation from the US government. Mr Butler, who was strongly criticised last year by some countries for making a similar decision, said the recommendation "could impact on the safety of our people".
Mr Annan has cut short a visit to North Africa to return to New York because of the crisis. Last February he succeeded in defusing that crisis during a visit to Baghdad, where he secured the agreement of Mr Saddam to allow UN inspections of presidential palaces and closely guarded sites.
In addition to the UNSCOM inspectors, another 300 UN humanitarian workers have been evacuated from Iraq. The US State Department has begun withdrawing non-essential personnel and their families from US embassies in Kuwait and Israel.
The chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen Hugh Shelton, said yesterday that "a decision has not been made as to the use of force", but that Saddam Hussein understood that all options were on the table.
His defiance of the United Nations "poses a threat to an area that is a vital national interest to the United States and . . . he poses a threat not only to his neighbours but to the 20,000 men and women of the United States that serve in that region," Gen Shelton said.
The Israeli Defence Ministry said yesterday that a US attack on Iraq soon was "very likely".